Results

According to the definitions of Smart Cities analysed in this work, it is possible to find some common features and one constant aspect in most of the definitions is technology. ICT’s are included in projects to improve the adaptability of a city. Nevertheless, the concept of sustainability or environmental responsibility is not sufficiently present in these definitions.

By looking at the definitions of smart sustainable cities, excluding keywords in Smart Cities definitions and how to achieve the objectives through ICTs, other factors come into focus;

resource efficiency, cost and energy savings, environmental impacts, etc. According to the definitions of smart sustainable cities described, it can be noticed that the projects evaluated have characteristics mentioned by the definitions. Most of the projects are related using information and communication technologies for a smarter and more efficient use of resources. In addition, they offer citizens better lives, environmental responsibility with a sustainable approach, energy savings and a reduction of the environmental footprint. It is also possible to find some projects (in less quantity), involving citizens in city governance, offering tangible economic growth and employment opportunities for citizens and investing in human and social capital.

The sectors of smart cities in the projects evaluated, mostly include projects that are in the sectors of Smart Environment and Smart Living. These projects integrate technology to reduce consumptions of energy and CO2 emissions and also integrate energy management systems in buildings and technology to provide living in more comfortable houses. The other sectors that follow Smart Environment and Smart Living are, in decreasing order of their quantity of projects, Smart Citizens, Smart Economy, Smart Mobility and Smart Governance.

In the two databases compared, Concerto’s database has many projects in Smart Environment and Smart Living and few projects in the other sectors of smart city.

However, the database of Mapping Smart Cities in Europe has a more regular distribution of projects in the different sectors of smart cities. Both databases have more projects in Smart Environment and fewer in Smart Governance.

From the evaluation of the relevance of sustainable consumption in the different sectors of smart cities, it is possible to affirm that sustainable consumption is not relevant in the sectors of Smart Governance and Smart Economy. This is in contrast to the sectors of Smart Citizens, Smart Mobility, Smart Living and Smart Environment, in which the concept is relevant.

From the results of sustainable consumption, 18.9% of the projects evaluated belong to the first classification. Projects involved in this category do not have any relation to sustainable consumption. However, it is important to have these kinds of projects to improve the cities’ skills and to give services to citizens.

The other classification is integrated by categories where sustainable consumption is relevant. We saw that 8.3% of the projects are in the lower category of the classification, which means that sustainable consumption is relevant but not implemented in the projects. Projects in this category should be more ambitious to reach a higher level of sustainable consumption. In addition, these projects are intended to change the behavioural consumption patterns, thereby reducing the impact of citizens.

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After analyzing the results, it can be seen that most of the projects evaluated consider sustainable consumption guidelines. 54.2% of the projects are in the second category of the SCo relevant. These projects implemented technology to reduce consumption but they do not care about changing the citizens’ behaviour. The rebound effect could be high if they do not involve the behaviour of citizens alongside this. The largest amount of these projects is located in central Europe.

Most of the projects that are in the higher category of SCo relevance are in northern Europe. They represent 37.5% of the projects and they make the concept of sustainable consumption to its full potential relevant. Through campaigns and explanations on how to manage and reduce energy consumption, it should be possible to change citizens’

behaviour.

It is important to identify some characteristics that allow projects to be in the higher category of SCo relevance. These characteristics are all related with the knowledge and behaviour of citizens. It is remarkable that these types of projects are related to car-sharing, generation of the citizens’ own energy, greater public awareness to reduce consumption at home, incentives for families that consume less and are contributing to sustainable energy use. It is noticeable that citizens in this area present sustainable consumption mind sent patterns. Projects involved in energy saving campaigns can also be found, influencing the behaviour of citizens, monitoring systems in apartments to let people know how much energy is spent, etc.

In conclusion, there are few projects that do not take into consideration sustainable consumption relevance. Therefore projects in Europe are moving towards the objectives to reduce CO2 emissions and energy consumption. Nevertheless, it is relevant to take into consideration the rebound effect that can be seen in several projects, and focus on how to reduce it.

Before beginning to work on this thesis, the main question was if sustainable consumption patterns have been involved in projects and how citizens could contribute to reduce their actions through new technologies. During this project, it has been realized that smart consumption is an important aspect that should be present in smart sustainable cities.

Projects have to involve this concept and be sure that citizens are already prepared to cooperate. New technologies help us save energy and reduce our consumption, but if there is a lack of smart consumption from the citizens, the rebound effect will be high and consumption could increase.

It is promising to see that projects are more focused on sustainable consumption and teaching that consumer actions affect the environment. It is undoubtedly necessary to focus on consumer learning because once the agents begin to understand and become aware of sustainable consumption, there will be a tendency to follow and continue on this path.

As the research and analysis of projects were being carried out, we encountered some limitations. Sometimes the information that was extracted from the projects was not clear or lacked clear explanation. In addition, limitations were found when classifying the projects into the different sectors of smart cities and in the classification of sustainable consumption. Sometimes the information of the projects found was not evident, and it would have been better to discuss these classifications with other researchers.

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The number of projects evaluated was not the same in every country. For this reason, countries that had only one project were discarded for not being representative. If analysis was conducted with the same number of projects evaluated in each country, the classification of both sectors of smart cities and sustainable consumption would be have been more suitable for comparisons across countries to be made.

Reading the projects of the cities and seinge how high the ambitions of the stakeholders are as well as the classification of the smart sectors and the sustainable consumption after the analysis were the most enjoyable part. Moreover, it was interesting to notice that the results give us an overview of the kind of projects presently occurring in Europe.

Since I grew up in Barcelona I have seen the transformation of the city on how to improve its skills. I have appreciated the development of the city in terms of the sector of smart city. However, nowadays I can understand the objectives of the projects that are involved in Barcelona better and the goals that they want to achieve. There are several examples of projects in my city that I have observed such as Bicing, to improve the green mobility in the city, car sharing, network traffic management, real time data, the district 22@, renewable energies, smart buildings, etc.

After this work, I have noticed that there are other questions to be answered following this thesis. I have made several proposals that can be discussed in future research:

1. Analyze in detail the environmental cost of the technology involved in the project and the benefits obtained.

Sometimes the cost of new technologies with the goal of reducing energy consumption or emissions is much higher than the benefits obtained. Therefore, the environmental payback has to be taken into consideration. Therefore, a high quantity of natural resources is needed to make good technology. On the other hand, the energy that can be saved with this technology is not high enough.

2. Question the relationship between the ambition of projects and the GDP per capita of the countries.

It is valuable to know whether countries with a higher GDP per capita have more ambitious projects than the countries with lower GDP per capita.

3. Analyze the success of the projects.

If the projects have achieved their objectives, how were they achieved? To answer this question, it will be necessary to wait a number of years to be sure that the projects are on a path to achieving their objectives. Additionally, it should be possible to see the limitations of the projects.

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